I haven't worked on this since Cincy's stinkin' Bearcats ruined everything. And thank you so much for bringing up such a painful subject. While you're at it, why don't you give me a nice paper cut and pour lemon juice over it? We're closed! Definitely a Notre Dame fan. It was a rough one. As [...]
Welcome back to the latest edition of Five Wide Fullbacks as we revisit our Top 25 Irish players from the pre-season, tackle Notre Dame's rushing performance, discuss bowl projections, rank the remaining opponents, and ponder when Alabama will lose next, if ever again. Let's get the ball, put our head down, and pick up 3 [...]
An inefficient Notre Dame offense reliant on explosive plays through the air met up with an elite passing defense, and Cincinnati's early turnovers and passing attack late held off the Irish for a massive win. While the game was full of self-inflicted errors at home for ND, Cincinnati wasn't perfect either, squandering many scoring chances [...]
Welcome back to the 18Stripes G5 Top 10. There was an obvious result (that I have to talk about from a certain POV), but there was a lot of shakeups in the Group of 5 World, causing some shuffling in the top ten. Also Considered: Fresno State, Nevada, Army, Wyoming, Houston Week 5 Recap Movers [...]
We can all agree turning the ball over in the end zone on the 1st possession of the game and eventually falling behind 17-0 are not good recipes for success. Notre Dame moved the ball well on that fateful first drive--and had a few more chances to make a comeback--but they were beaten soundly by [...]
There are coaching losses and there are coaching losses. For this game, the plan was fine (good, even - had one of those inside runs broken maybe it all would feel different), the placalling was fine. Turnovers, if you (as you should) count Cincy's missed field goals as turnovers, ended up even. But. ND set [...]
This is probably the biggest regular season weekend for Cincinnati since the weekend of December 5th, 2009. The Bearcats came into the weekend at #5 in the BCS Rankings, a spot they had held all November. They had a defacto Big East Championship showdown against a top fifteen Pitt team, and had an outside shot [...]
Notre Dame averaged 3.6 yards per play on offense, was stuffed on more than a third of its runs, and had the same number of offensive scoring chances as Wisconsin. Jack Coan was injured and Tyler Buchner unavailable, and the Irish averaged 4.2 yards per pass attempt to trail Graham Mertz who threw for 5.7. [...]
After a brief hiatus - life can be like that - we're back with some more advanced stats fun. We'll do the Lindsay Nelson thing and tell you that SP+ liked the Purdue game and FPI didn't before skipping ahead to later action. Interestingly, FPI was more impressed by the Wisconsin win than SP+ was, [...]
Ahead of a massive Week 5 and long list of intriguing matchups we had a pretty sleepy Week 4 free from a lot of drama. A few teams like Oklahoma, Iowa, BYU, Michigan, and Michigan State struggled to put their competition away only to survive and advance anyway. As evidence, only 2 teams in the [...]
Welcome back to the 18Stripes G5 Top 10. This week was a "slower" week for G5 compared to others; but still some interesting games to talk about. Let's dive into the new Top 10. Also Considered: Army, Liberty, Western Michigan, UAB, Marshall Week 4 Recap Movers and Shakers Let’s start with one of the headliners [...]
As expected, a defensive battle broke out in Chicago between Notre Dame and Wisconsin with the Badgers clinging to a 3-point lead early in the 4th quarter. With the Irish quarterback sidelined due to a leg injury things were starting to look a little bleak for Notre Dame. Instead, one of the most fun and [...]
Imagine any Notre Dame team from 1997-2014 winning a game in which its third-string quarterback was taking whacks behind a line anchored by its third and fourth-string left tackle while the starting defensive tackle was out too. The Irish have reached that level as a program and they proved it with a satisfying 31-point fourth-quarter [...]
It's the long-awaited return of the Shamrock Series, except Notre Dame is the away team, wearing their home blue, for a game that is on the Fox Big Noon lineup, and in the Fighting Irish territory of Chicago at Soldier Field. Okay, let's break down this super weird college football game. Modern Wisconsin football has [...]
Alabama survives a scare in the Swamp, Penn State holds serve over visiting Auburn, while UCLA blows all the goodwill they built up early in this 2021 season. Elsewhere, Clemson survived a near brutal upset by the Bees and Cincinnati comes back to defeat Indiana in the scorching Bloomington heat. Let's take a look at [...]
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